


why won't you let me do this for you, rose?

by schrodingers_zombie



Category: Steven Universe (Cartoon)
Genre: During the War, Episode: s02e09 Sworn To The Sword, F/F, Gen, Pre-Series, Self-Sacrifice, Self-Worth Issues, Sworn To The Sword, pearls as mass produced servants, rose's Pearl
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-02
Updated: 2015-08-02
Packaged: 2018-04-12 15:15:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 337
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4484282
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/schrodingers_zombie/pseuds/schrodingers_zombie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>pearl's self worth issues during the war, thinking she is just a shield for rose quartz</p>
            </blockquote>





	why won't you let me do this for you, rose?

**Author's Note:**

> hhhhhh pearlrose feels  
> (um this ends on a sad note so hopefully later ill add chapters. im thinking one with rose talking to pearl about this, one when rose dies and steven is born, idk)

The first time was early in the war.  
They were surrounded by Homeworld gems, three to each one of them.  
In the heat of battle, Pearl didn't have time to think. She saw an axe blade bearing down on Rose and before she knew it, it was coming down on her instead.  
Pearls didn't think. They served.  
All those years of struggling to feel and think and live for herself, gone in an instant. Her only purpose was _protect Rose_ at that moment.  
At first she would reform immediately. That was risky, yes, but she couldn't leave Rose Quartz undefended.  
Rose Quartz was more important than a simple pearl.  
Rose was everything.  
Pearl was just another shield.  
But reforming immediately didn't work- she couldn't protect Rose without hands or a head or another useful part.  
So she learned to calculate the exact amount of time she needed- the exact amount of time so her form would be usable, but Rose was left vulnerable for the absolute minimum time. No new forms, that took too long. Just recreate the same one. Shields didn't have to look nice. They had to be there.  
By the hundredth time Pearl sacrificed her (useless, unimportant, inconsequential) body for Rose, it was natural.  
Leap. Die. Thirty minutes and twenty-seven seconds of utmost concentration. Reform. Repeat.  
No thinking. Pearls didn't think. They served.  
And at the end of the day, Rose would be alive. And that was all that mattered, Rose being alive. Rose being alive because of her Pearl.  
After the war, when Rose would be safe forever, Pearl could stop. Then she and Rose (and everyone else, of course, that would be necessary, she supposed) could live together and be happy and alive and Pearl could be more than a shield again.  
But for now, she was just Rose's shield. Rose's knight.  
She lived for Rose. She would die permanently for Rose, if needed.  
Her heart, her body, her life were Rose's.  
That was all that mattered. Rose Quartz.  
Not her pearl.


End file.
